Stardust
by irishais
Summary: Baltimore, 1929. A hitman in the Gibbs crime family meets a transplanted jazz singer in a darkened bar. He thinks he's seen a movie like this once, and is pretty sure it didn't end well. Tony/Ziva, AU.
1. everybody loves a winner

**.:STARDUST:.**

_-irishais-_

* * *

_The wise old owl sat on an oak._

_The more he saw, the less he spoke,_

_the less he spoke, the more he heard. _

* * *

_One: everybody loves a winner_

Leroy Jethro Gibbs stood at the edge of the shore, looking across the harbor at the Baltimore skyline. At three in the morning, there were very few people out and about— only a few of the most die-hard oyster fishermen were awake at this hour, and none of them were near here.

"Dump it," he said, and a couple of his men dragged the wrapped up corpse out of the trunk of the car, heaving it into the water.

"Think anyone'll find it?" Franks asked, sucking on another cigarette like they were going out of style. Gibbs watched the small splash and tracked the corpse as it sank into the water. It was a moot question, but it was a ritual, a test. The answer never changed. If it did, something had really gone wrong.

"That water's filthy enough that he'll rot before anyone even realizes he's gone," Gibbs replied, and turned away once the body had disappeared from sight. His men waited for Gibbs and Franks to slide back into the black Lincoln before they shut the door and got into the front seats.

"I'm getting too old for this shit." Franks rolled down the window and let the cool early-morning air flow through the car, flicking his cigarette butt out onto the gravel road as the driver pulled away from the edge of the harbor. "You gotta dump your bodies during regular business hours, rookie."

Gibbs snorted, softly. "Yes, because that'll go over real well when Fornell and his crew start getting calls about corpses going into the harbor at three in the afternoon rather than the middle of the night."

"We could be slick about it." His mentor reached into his inner pocket for another cigarette, and lit up. The bittersweet tobacco smell filled the car; Gibbs waved away the curl of smoke that floated in front of his face. Franks didn't miss the motion. "It's not gonna kill you, rookie," he commented. "And I'm sure the Feds have better things to worry about than a few losers goin' into the harbor."

Gibbs ignored him. The car rumbled onward, through the empty streets of Federal Hill, winding through the narrow residential stretches before it stopped in front of a nondescript stretch of row houses. The Lincoln's engine rumbled as the car idled. "Good night, Mike," he said, inclining his head toward the door, and the houses beyond. Franks gave him a long, hard look, and sucked down the last bit of his cigarette.

"Yeah, yeah," he said finally, and pushed open his door, leaving a lingering scent of smoke like cheap cologne in his wake.

_xx_

_Three months earlier_

The owl's eyes were blinking, and that meant a good night for Tony DiNozzo. It meant the feds weren't in town, so he could enjoy a good single malt older than he was in peace. Real scotch, not that fake stuff that they were passing off elsewhere in the city. He brought the cut-glass tumbler to his mouth— the taste was honey on fire as it flowed down his throat.

Delicious.

He set the glass back onto the polished wood of the bar, leaned back, and sighed as his muscles popped and eased. He reached inside his jacket pocket and pulled out a pack of Chesterfields, shaking one out of the worn paper package. The match lit on the first strike, and he held the flame to the tip of the cigarette, inhaling deeply. A cig and a good drink. What a perfect finish to a perfect murder.

_Assassination_, he corrected himself mentally. Murder was such a strong word. The boss preferred, "disposed of," but Tony always thought that seemed too cagey, too hands-off for the whole situation, because honestly, when you were breaking into a guy's house in the middle of the night and putting a gun to the dead-center of his forehead, it was murder. Or assassination.

He drank some more scotch. Behind him, the band started up a new number, something familiar. He'd heard it played in other bars; it was new, pretty popular, he'd gathered. Tony only tended to pay attention to the music they used in the pictures.

_Sometimes I wonder why I spend_

_The lonely nights dreaming of a song_

_The melody haunts my reverie_

_And I am once again with you..._

The voice was haunting, floating out of the small, dimly lit stage at the back of the bar. Tony exhaled a mouthful of smoke, and took another sip of his scotch in its wake.

_When our love was new_

_And each kiss an inspiration..._

He knew what he would find when he turned around— a half dozen couples spinning on the little square dance floor, delirious with illegal drink and talk and music. He turned anyway, and there was the familiar scene, never failing to disappoint.

The singer was a stunning brunette, her dark hair cascading in waves around her face. The few lights around the stage winked off the satin of her dress, making it shimmer like blue water. Her eyes were closed, and she sang into the microphone like it was breaking her heart.

_Ah, but that was long ago_

_Now my consolation is in the stardust of a song..._

Tony found it very difficult to take his eyes off of her, and so he didn't bother to until a clump of ash fell off the tip of his cigarette and hit him in the leg. He swore quietly, brushing it off onto the floor, and felt like a fool for getting so distracted by a beautiful woman. When he looked up, she was looking at him.

_Though I dream in vain_

_In my heart it will remain_

_My stardust melody_

_The memory of love's refrain..._

There was a round of applause, and Tony turned back to his drink, tossing back the last of it.

"Buy a lady a drink?"

He nearly choked on the mouthful of liquor, and swallowed quickly, covering up his fumble with a brief cough to clear his through. She was standing next to him suddenly, her voice as silken as the scotch he'd just swallowed. He hadn't even realized that she had left the stage.

She laughed, a silvery, throaty sound. "I asked if you wanted to buy me a drink, not choke to death on your own." She gestured, and the bartender ambled over at her summons.

Tony stubbed out the last bit of his cigarette in the ashtray. "Oscar," he said, holding the singer's gaze, "get the lady with the pretty eyes whatever she wants."

The bartender nodded, and she ordered a glass of Cabernet; the wine that Oscar brought her was so dark it looked black in the dim lighting. She lifted the glass and swirled the wine, inhaling its bouquet- the motion was like a private ritual, so sincere in its intentions.

"The lady knows her wine," Tony commented.

She sipped from the glass. He watched the movement of her throat as she swallowed. "The lady does."

"What's your name?" he asked.

"Ziva." Her unfamiliar accent drew out the word as _Zee-vaah_.

"Tony," he replied, even though she hadn't asked. "Do you sing here often, Miss Ziva?" Her name rolled off his tongue.

"Not often." She declined to offer any other details; her long, elegant finger, topped with a nail painted a deep crimson, traced a ring around the edge of the glass. "Do you, Mr. Tony?"

"Sing? No, not so much." Tony raised his glass to the bartender, and Oscar pulled the bottle of single malt out from behind the bar, pouring a generous amount into the tumbler. "Thanks," he said. Oscar nodded, and withdrew.

"Then do you drink here often?" She eyed his glass.

His reply was a mimic of her deliberate terseness. "Not often." He found he couldn't maintain her facade of mystery, and allowed a smile to come to the corners of his mouth.

Ziva raised her glass, and clinked it against his. "To infrequent chances, then," she said.

"Hear, hear," Tony agreed, and tossed back a mouthful of his drink. It was going to be a good night for him, indeed.

_xx_

When he woke up the next morning, it was with a killer headache and the lingering scent of a beautiful woman's perfume in his bedsheets. He stretched and yawned, flinging aside the bedding.

"Oh, god," he mumbled upon sitting up and discovering that his head was not feeling quite firmly attached. The room spun to the left for a second, and settled. There had been drinking, flirting, a walk back to his place... he couldn't remember a whole lot of the rest of the evening, but it must have been fantastic. His foot hit something as he stood carefully- his emergency stash of bourbon, carefully hidden in a drawer beneath his underwear. The bottle was three-quarters empty.

Well. That explained the headache.

Tony stumbled out of his bedroom and into the small kitchenette. There was a note waiting for him, written on a napkin, set on his wobbly kitchen table and anchored in place by the salt shaker; unless there was another woman sneaking into his apartment, Ziva had very pretty handwriting.

_Jasmine tea with lime for the hangover. _

"Disgusting," he mumbled, setting down the note and picking up the salt. He pulled a glass out of the cabinet, filled it with some water, and dumped a pinch of salt into it. It took him a moment to locate the Tabasco, and even longer to find the lemon, buried as it was in the back of his refrigerator. He sent up the closest thing he had for a prayer of thanks for old family recipes- half a DiNozzo Detonator later, and he would be feeling right as rain.

He sat at the table, and fingered the edge of Ziva's note.

_xx_

There was a fleck of dried blood under her nail, Ziva realized. She hadn't noticed it last night because of the nail polish she had so carefully applied, but it was there, just under her thumbnail

She picked at it absently, gazing out at the harbor as the car cruised down Light Street.

The whole thing had gone cleanly.

Gibbs would be glad to hear it.


	2. a coke and a smile

_Two: a coke and a smile  
_

"I hear you met a girl."

Tony tugged on his glove and checked the rounds in his pistol before he stashed it back into his shoulder holster. "What grapevine did you hear that on?" he asked.

"It's not exactly a secret."

He snorted. "Tim, Tim, Tim, your smarts never fail to astound me. I did meet a fine, upstanding lady-"

"Until you got her into your bed."

"I would never- don't look at me like that, Tim. You wound me."

Tim McGee rolled his eyes. "Tony, I _know _you."

"Yeah, well, I would hope so at this point," Tony said, as McGee pulled the Ford to the curb and killed the engine. He pushed open his door and stepped out, nodding his head in brief greeting at a couple walking by. The woman threw him a second glance over her shoulder, her blonde bob glistening in the early afternoon sun. He smiled. She blushed.

"I thought you met a girl," McGee commented, watching the blonde continue down the street, hanging onto the arm of her man. She was very pretty, but Tony made eyes at anything with a nice set of legs and a pulse.

"I _met _a girl. Doesn't mean she's the last girl on earth or anything." Tony led the way into the building, down a narrow hall, to the stairs. "She's a knockout, though, Tim. Sings like an angel."

"You'll have to bring her around."

"If I ever see her again." They ascended another flight of stairs; he slipped the silencer out of his pocket and screwed it onto his gun.

"You know where she works."

"She is..." He thought about it for a few seconds. "An infrequent contributor to the Owl's ambiance. However," he added, shoving open the door to the third floor, "I am...what's the word I'm looking for, Tim?"

"Persistent."

"Ah, yes. That would be the one. Persistent. And I did mention she is very, very pretty, right?"

McGee pulled his revolver from the holster underneath his jacket, holding it low, keeping it discreet in case someone happened to be wandering the halls of a low-rent apartment building looking for more trouble than was strictly necessary. It had happened. "A couple of times, I think."

"Oh, good. I just wanted to make sure that part was clear." He knocked once, waited for a second, and then shoved his body weight against the door, ripping the cheap lock out of the even cheaper door frame.

"What the _hell_-" came from within the apartment, but Tony fired once, low, a crippling shot to the leg to keep his target from running away. The man fainted dead away, like a dame in a cheap dime novel. Funny. He'd been expecting more of a fight. Or at least some screaming.

"You know, Tony, you might remember that every time you shoot someone in the leg, it makes it impossible to get them down the stairs easily, right?" McGee knelt by the guy, avoiding the small pool of blood, and checked his pulse. "Still alive."

"Well, Dr. McGiggles, I would certainly hope so." Tony crouched on the other side, and, on the count of three, they hauled the man to his feet, dragging him toward the door. An old lady stuck her head out of a nearby room as they were wrestling the body into the stairwell. "Jimmy, I told you that all those mixed liquors would just end badly," he added loudly. The man stirred and groaned, and the old woman ducked back inside her apartment. "C'mon. It's only gonna hurt until you pass out again."

Gibbs held court on the second level of a warehouse he owned near Fell's Point, and it was there to which Tony and McGee dragged their unlucky contestant, dragging him out of the cramped service lift and dumping him into a dinged-up metal chair. He jolted awake at the impact, looking around wildly.

Tony pitied him, a little. But only just a little.

"Good work, boys." Gibbs said, and Tony had to admit, the boss had a flair for the dramatic, his voice coming out of a darkened corner. Very Hollywood. He could be in pictures. "Now. Get out of here. Leon and I have some...business to discuss."

"You wanna go get a drink?" Tony asked, as they shut the door to Gibbs' office behind them.

McGee nodded, mopping his forehead with his handkerchief and setting his fedora back on his head. "Yeah. I could use something cold."

_xx_

Abby Sciuto was out of Coca-Cola, and it was making concentrating very difficult as she pressed her face to the microscope and carefully sorted out the small pile of debris with a pair of tweezers. So far, this wasn't going quite as planned- she was trying to see if it really was possible to differentiate between several different cigarette varieties based on just the color of the ash they left behind. The problem was, Jimmy had done entirely too good of a job grinding it all up when he mixed the sample together for her.

She would have to have a word with him, or several. They might even be very loud words.

"Ducky," she called, sitting back from the microscope. "I'm going out for lunch. Do you want to come?"

There was only silence, and so Abby slipped off of her stool, grabbing her wrap, handbag and hat from the hook she'd hung them all on, and walked down the hall from the small office to the morgue.

"-burials by sea. A shame you had to get yours in the harbor. Who knows what else has been buried there with you to put you in such a state..." Dr. Mallard was digging through the corpse laid out on the metal table before him, excising bits and putting them in little jars.

"Ducky?"

"Ah, Abigail. I heard your shout from down the hall. In my day, it was the gentleman who invited the lady to lunch."

Abby settled her hat atop her head. "It's 1929, Ducky. Times are changing."

The diner down the street was small, quaint. Abby liked it because they didn't give her a sideways glance when she sometimes spent hours there, poring over her research and downing glass after glass of brown cola. She sat at the small table and sighed.

"What's wrong, my dear?" Ducky asked.

"Oh, it's nothing. Just this sample I'm trying to analyze. Jimmy got the concentrations all wrong and mixed it up too finely, so I'm probably going to have to start all over from the beginning."

"He's new. Give him time."

She sipped at her drink, the sweet, syrupy drink refreshing. Exactly what she needed.

"I know, I know. It's just frustrating, is all."

The chime above the door jingled as another couple of patrons entered, two men in long dark coats. Abby watched them as they walked in, and the waitress led them to a table nearby.

"Tim?" Abby said, as the younger of the two removed his hat and coat. "Tim McGee?"

He blinked, and turned toward her. "Yeah- wait. Abby?"

"Yes!" She slipped out of her chair and hugged him impulsively. "It's so good to see you!"

"You, too," he said, awkwardly patting her back.

"Oh!" Abby let him go and turned to Ducky. "Ducky, this is Tim McGee. We went to school together. He taught me half the things I know."

"Only half?" Ducky asked. "Dr. Mallard. It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Miss Scuito held her own, as I recall," Tim said, shaking his hand. "And this is my associate."

"Tony," the other man finished quickly, nodding his head at them. "Nice to meet you all. Any friend of Tim's a friend of mine." He smiled charmingly- he was very attractive, Abby decided. Not quite her type, but attractive nonetheless.

"So," Abby said, after a pause, "what sorts of things have you been up to, Tim?"

He shrugged. "This and that. Holding some odd jobs."

"Science for hire?" she joked. They both laughed.

"Yeah, basically. You? You look well. I heard Hopkins wanted you to stay."

She felt her cheeks redden. "Not really. I'm working with Dr. Mallard at the coroner's office now. He hired me right after graduation."

"Well, good. Good. Congratulations. I'm happy for you."

There was another pause. If there was one thing medical school had taught Abby Sciuto, it was how to read people, and she got the distinct sensation that Timothy McGee was hiding something. "Yes, it was pretty swell of him to take me on. I'm glad we were able to talk, Tim. Don't be a stranger, okay?"

He nodded. "Of course not. Now that I know where to find you, I'll look you up."

She hugged him again as Dr. Mallard headed for the counter to pay the bill. "See you later, Timmy," she said.

_xx_

"Looks like I'm not the only one who knows a pretty girl," Tony commented, watching the dark-haired, mysterious Abby slip away through the array of tables.

"We went to med school together."

"Medical school or not, she's a looker. Did you date her?"

"A couple of times. It's not a big deal."

"You saw someone socially. It's a very big deal. I should notify the press." Tony swirled his glass, the ice clinking against the sides. "Gibbs would be happy to know that you know someone in the police department. What's she do? She a secretary?"

"Forensics medicine, probably. She was really good at it."

Tony raised his glass of lemonade toward McGee. "The boss will _really _be glad to know that."

McGee sighed and tossed back a mouthful of his drink, not deigning to respond.


	3. your name in lights

_Three: your name in lights_

She was crooning a love song when he walked into the Owl Bar that evening, her voice weaving its way through the little crowd to meet him at the door.

_Just who can solve its mystery_

_why should it make_

_a fool of me?_

Tony stopped at the bar long enough to pick up his drink and then took up residence at one of the small two-person tables near the stage. The lights mounted above the stage glanced off the ice in his glass, and he was getting a sense of déjà vu. Tony set the glass down and watched Ziva sway with the music. She was a mysterious creature, more mysterious than most women he had encountered. And Tony DiNozzo had known many women.

Well, not _that _many women. But enough of them that Ziva David intrigued the hell out of him.

He hadn't intended to come here, not after last night- he didn't think his head could take that kind of assault two days in a row, not to mention his liver, but as he sat by the window of his apartment earlier that evening, flipping through one of his old favorite issues of _Weird Tales_, the warm spring night and the noises of the city had made him restless. There was always something to do in Baltimore, but instead of catching a cab to Fell's Point, or going to one of his usual theater haunts, he found himself led by traitorous feet up East Chase, to the hotel, where the bright owl sign promised good times.

_I saw you there_

_one wonderful day_

_you took my heart_

_and threw it away_

The owl had never led anyone astray. The bartenders had a system worked out- if the eyes were turned on, it meant there were cops in town, and while Baltimore largely let the Volstead Act slide on by and happen to _other_ cities, it never hurt to be subtle about it. When the eyes were blinking, it meant nothing but good times.

_That's why I ask the lord_

_in heaven above_

_what is this thing_

_called love?_

Ziva finished her song to a smattering of applause- more than there had been the night before. Tony tried to figure out if he'd heard her anywhere else other than here- he really shouldn't be able to forget a voice like that- but she slid gracefully into another song, a number he _did _know, and he forgot what he was thinking about.

It didn't matter. The whiskey was velvet over fire on his tongue and the music was swell.

She caught him looking as she stepped off the stage after her song, and she wove through the cluster of tables gracefully.

"Fancy meeting you here," Ziva said as he stood and pulled out a chair for her. She seated herself, smoothing her ivory satin skirt over her knees.

"Didn't think you'd see me again?" he asked, flicking a bit of ash into the ashtray.

"I was hoping that you were not that type." Ziva smiled, and there was something hidden in it, something Tony couldn't quite place. She tucked a curl of hair that had escaped from her simple up do back behind her ear; he was immediately reminded of how soft her hair was, when his fingers were running through it, and was very glad she did not follow the style to crop it short. "I am glad to see that I was wrong." Her earrings were made of some delicate white drop bead- they winked in the dim light.

"I'm a surprise a minute," he said. A few waiters in crisp white jackets were circling the room, and Tony flagged one down. "What're you drinking?"

_xx_

"So, what do you do, Mr. DiNozzo, when you are not flirting with women in bars?" Ziva asked later, as they were strolling down the sidewalk.

"This and that," he said, and his answer reminded him of how McGee had answered that forensics woman's question earlier that day. "Mostly that, but a little of this."

She frowned a little. "I am not quite sure I understand."

"Don't fret about it. Just a joke. I'm largely self-employed."

"Do you enjoy it?"

Tony shrugged. "It could be worse." They crossed the street.

"That is what my father says. It can always be worse. He was always honest about things like that." Her fingers had tensed where they rested against his arm, and Tony looked at her. She looked away.

"Where's your father now?"

"In Palestine. He has his company there. It was where I grew up."

_Palestine_. Tony tried to imagine being that far away from here, and failed spectacularly at it. He rarely went much further north than New York City. "That's quite a trip. What brought you here?" he asked.

"My brother had some business here two years ago. He invited me along. I never left. This way," she added, turning right at the next intersection. She led him to a white-marble fronted building.

"So your brother just left you here to become a jazz singer," Tony said. "That's an interesting tale. Sounds like a movie."

"It is not nearly so interesting as it is in the pictures," Ziva said. "He returned to Israel. I stayed with a family friend until I found an apartment. I also did...what did you call it? A 'little of this and of that'?"

He chuckled. "Yeah. So, the singing is something new, then?"

"No, I have always liked to sing. Recently, it seemed more prudent to get paid to do so, rather than do it alone." She took a step toward the door of the building- Tony noticed that, unlike his, this one had a doorman. He wondered how much of her income was supplemented by her mysterious father. Ziva coughed, lightly. "Do you want to come up?" she asked.

"If you want me to," he said. The exchange was awkward- neither of them were drunk enough for it to be as easy as it was yesterday.

"If I did not want you to, I would not have asked."

Well.

Tony followed her into the building. Her building _did _have an elevator, a small, gold-painted thing, barely big enough for two when he pulled the gate closed after them. Ziva pressed the button for the sixth floor, and he watched the floors pass them by. Finally, the elevator glided to a stop, and he pulled the gate open. Ziva stepped out, and led him down the hall, removing a key from her small beaded bag.

She fetched a couple of cold bottles from her refrigerator, popping the lids off with a deftness he hadn't expected, and handed him one. He drank, deeply. Beer. He should've been surprised, and wasn't.

"Nice place," he said, and it was, sparsely furnished, but neat. Nothing like his mother's overbearing hand. No unnecessary flowers, or floral patterns. Lots and lots of books, however, filled a huge bookshelf by the window, spilling over into several piles stacked around the room. He stepped forward to check out her collection. Fitzgerald, Yeats, Shaw, Hemingway... "You read all of these?" he asked, reaching out and touching the spines. There were many more authors he didn't recognize, and even more books titled in languages he didn't know.

"At least once," she said from behind him, and suddenly soft strains of music began to fill the air. Tony turned, and Ziva stepped away from the radio, setting down her bottle on a small end table. She plucked his out of his hand, set it aside, and slipped her arms around his neck. "Dance with me," she commanded.

He did, and when he finally couldn't stand it anymore, he tilted her chin up with a finger to kiss her.

It was much better without the interference of bourbon.

_xx_

Ziva sat up in bed, blanket drawn up and tucked under her arms, with Tony's head in her lap. She stroked his hair gently- he lost a lot of his swagger when he was sleeping, she had realized, before she had slipped out of his apartment very early yesterday morning.

She distinctly hoped Gibbs was wrong about him, because she was starting to feel a little bit guilty about worming her way into his life like this. _Whatever it takes_, Gibbs had told her. _Do it. _

So here she was, doing whatever it took to earn Tony DiNozzo's trust, in hopes that he was loose-lipped enough that she could get what Gibbs wanted. Tony made a noise, and shifted. She ran her fingers down his cheek.

_What secrets are you hiding_?

His eyes opened, like she had spoken out loud, and Ziva stilled her hand.

"Hello," she said softly, and he tilted his head, pressing a kiss to her palm. She let him. "Did you have pleasant dreams?"

"Very," he said, the word ending on a yawn. "Did you sleep?"

"Some." She smoothed his hair back, and her theory worked- his eyes slipped shut again.

Ziva looked across the room blankly, catching her reflection in the mirror mounted above her vanity. In that brief glance, she could not help but notice how very weary she looked.

_Whatever it takes. _


End file.
